The Days of Rain
by BoothBonesLover1
Summary: 'So, is this like a five minute time out situation, or are we running like a bat out of hell...' Elena flees Mystic Falls by herself, only to find that she's not anywhere near as alone on her journey as she thought she was. Post ep for All My Children.


**Author's Note: This is something that I just couldn't banish from my head after "All My Children", when Damon turns Bonnie's mother into a vampire. This is canon up until that episode, and is a post episode from there. **

**I hope you enjoy this ride with me as we follow Elena on a journey of self exploration and growth with a little help from our favorite, sinfully sexy vampire.  
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**Rated T for now, just some bad language.  
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**Disclaimer: I own nothing.  
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* * *

**Day One**

_Leave. Leave. Leave. Leave. _The words repeated like a mantra in Elena's head as she threw all the clothes she could find in the suitcase that she had retrieved from the attic minutes earlier.

_Leave. Leave. Leave. Leave. Leave!_ The instinct to flee was getting stronger by the second, more incessant in her head. She felt like she was positively crawling in her skin, like the walls of her bedroom were closing in on her, and that if she didn't get out, she would go crazy. Out of her bedroom. Out of Mystic Falls. Out of her crazy doppelganger life.

The letter from Elijah was sitting on the window seat, fluttering in the light breeze coming through the window, and the words of his regret and his apologies were still branded on her mind. He said he had done things that he regretted to protect his family, things that he hadn't thought he was capable of, and she realized that she had too – she had stayed all this time, despite her instincts to run, she had stayed, and now she had one more unintentional victim in Bonnie's mother. Regret flooded through her mind, practically crippling her as she realized the damage she had caused to virtually everyone around her.

She ran through the list of her victims as she opened her dresser and scooped up everything within sight, throwing it hastily into the now overflowing suitcase. Her mother, father, Vicki, Jenna, John, Caroline, Tyler, Matt, Bonnie, Bonnie's Grams, Bonnie's mother, Jeremy, Alaric, Stefan, and Damon. They may not all have been dead, but each one had suffered a grievous loss or had suffered because of her in one way or another over the past two years. Why hadn't she left in the beginning? How could she have let it get this far? How could she have been so selfish?

As she threw her shoes into a duffle bag, she glanced up at her mirror, and stopped to look at the image that was reflected there. Pale, thin, tired, haggard. Dirt streaked across her face from the cave that she had been confined in. Tear tracks down her cheeks from where she had cried after leaving Bonnie's house. Who was this girl looking back at her? Where was the happy and healthy girl from her freshman year? Where was the girl who had been well-loved by her parents, happy with her quarterback boyfriend, happy with her cheerleading squad and her straight A's and her solid 8 hours of sleep a night? She didn't know that girl at all. That girl was so far gone that she didn't even remember her, or anything about what it was like to be her. All she knew was this - this constant worry, this constant regret, this constant exhaustion, this constant fear. Would it ever stop? She just wanted to be that happy and innocent Elena again.

Her eyes drifted to the pictures that were tucked into the edges of her mirror, and on an impulse, she went over and reached out to snag them. One of her parents, smiling at her from the swing on the front porch. One of her Aunt Jenna and Alaric, taken at the Miss Mystic Falls Dance. One of herself and Jeremy at Christmas the previous year. One of her with Bonnie and Caroline, eyes lit up, pom poms in hand. One of her and Stefan, the same one he had kept in his room. All her loved ones, captured forever in the blink of an eye by a camera to remind her of how she had been happy. Well, all except one. She realized with a now familiar feeling of regret that she had no pictures of her with Damon among her collage of loved ones – in fact she had no pictures of her with Damon, or of Damon at all. How could that be? How could she not have any lasting images of someone who meant so much to her? Who had been there for her when no one else had? Who she counted on to get through each and every day?

She grabbed the pictures and slipped them into the bag as her mind conjured up images of Damon in the parlor from earlier in the day. He had been so different this morning, so cocky, so emotionless, so much less like the Damon who so thoroughly and recklessly loved her, and so much more like the Damon who had breezed into Mystic Falls two years before, death, destruction, and Katherine on his mind. Where did her Damon go? She furiously wiped a tear from her cheek as she tried not to think about the fact that yet again, it was her fault that the Damon she had known was gone because of her - because she couldn't stop herself from saying mean and hurtful things that she didn't mean. That was the killer part - she had said something that she _didn't even mean_, and now it was too late. She wished she could apologize to him, let him know how sorry she was, but he didn't even seem to care. He had moved on. To fucking Rebekah. Well fuck him. Even though she knew better, she rationalized that he couldn't have loved her that much if it only took him one day to move on to the fucking evil blood slut.

She grabbed her bags, now more angry than regretful, and stormed down the stairs to her car – thankful that no one else was in the house to hear her making such a racket. She opened the trunk, threw her bags in, and ran back into the house. She grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge and the made her way back up the stairs to stand in front of the bedroom that Alaric used – the one that he and Jenna had shared before Jenna's involvement in Elena's life had gotten her killed.

Her heart squeezed painfully as she stepped into the room and made her way over to the dresser, carefully opening the top drawer. As she squashed down the shamed feeling that was sweeping through her at her actions, she reached towards the back and found what she was looking for – a rubber banded wad of bills that Ric kept for emergencies. She shoved the money into her pocket, and walked quickly over to the desk in the corner, grabbing a pen and a piece of paper.

_I'm so sorry. _

_I'm sorry I didn't leave sooner. I should have, and then none of this would have happened. Caroline, I'm sorry about your Dad and Tyler, and Bonnie I am so sorry about your Mom and your Grams. If I hadn't been here, none of this would have happened, so I hope you all understand why I have to do this. Ric, I'm sorry for taking your secret stash – you have been a good father to me, I'll miss you, and I will try to pay you back some day. Stefan, I'm sorry that I am not staying to see the real you come back to us. Stay strong, and stay off the human blood. Damon, I'm just so sorry. What I said at the ball was a lie – I don't feel that way even a little bit. Please don't turn back to your old ways. If there's one last thing that you do for me, be the you that I knew, because he's amazing, and I like him just the way he is. _

_I love you all._

_Elena_

Elena wiped the tears away from her eyes, and laid the note down on the desk, leaving the room as quickly as she could. She ran down the stairs, out the front door, and jumped into the car just as a light rain started to fall. As she passed the sign telling her that she was leaving Mystic Falls, the tears began to stream down her face. She was ready to be someone other than Elena Gilbert, and now faced with the limitless possibilities of where to go, she had not thoughts other than to just drive.

* * *

**Day Two**

Elena flipped the switch to turn her windshield wipers on a faster speed, sending them across her windshield at frantic pace. The torrential rain that was falling was flying all over the place as the wipers whipped back and forth. It was almost 4 in the morning, and she'd been on the road for 6 hours. She was cold, tired, and utterly exhausted. Her eyes were red, puffy, and sore from crying on and off for 6 hours, and she couldn't see the fucking road for all the fucking rain. It was pitch black, just like her mood, and although her headlights were making feeble attempts to cut through the curtain of water, she could barely see where she was going. She fucking hated rain!

She spied a dimly lit gas station on the right up ahead, and she pulled off, desperate to get out and stretch her legs – and maybe down a Redbull or two, or three, or four - whatever it took to give her enough energy to put at least another 10 hours of driving between her and Mystic Falls. She scrambled out of the car, slammed the door, running as fast as she could through the falling rain into the dry shelter of the little store.

Behind the counter sat a young man, unkempt, bleary eyed, wholly focused on the Nintendo DS in his hands. He didn't seem to notice her at all until she set her provisions down on the counter to pay: a Twix bar, a Pay Day, a huge pack of Twizzlers, Twinkies, Funyuns, Gatorade, a Diet Coke, and the requisite four Redbulls. If she already felt like shit, why not eat like it too?

The boy looked at the stuff laid out in front of him in surprise, and then up at her with wide eyes, but rang it up without question when she shot him a warning look. She paid him what he asked, took the bag from him, inhaled a deep breath, and ran back to her car, throwing the bag in the passenger seat, and wiping her water soaked hair from her eyes. She reached into the bag and pulled out the first beverage she could get her hands on, desperate to re-hydrate and revive herself so she could keep going. She sighed in relief as the first hit of liquid hit her parched throat, and she felt a little better as she chugged down as much of it as she could handle.

"So, is this like a five minute time out situation, or are we running like a bat out of hell and pretending that Mystic Falls doesn't exist anymore?"

Elena's heart stopped and she choked on the Gatorade that she had just taken a sip of as she heard the dark and velvety voice that haunted all her dreams. She coughed violently and turned to see where the voice was coming from, and met the ice blue eyes on the face of the man lounging on her back seat. "What the fuck are you doing here, Damon?"

"Oh please, Elena," he scoffed, looking at her in disbelief, eyes flashing in both amusement and irritation, "Whether you would like to admit it or not, I know you better than anyone else in the world. I knew you were going to flee from the moment you found out I had turned Bonnie's Mom tonight. One more sacrifice in the effort to keep Elena Gilbert alive and well, and one more that you feel like you have to shoulder all the blame for." He rolled his eyes, and leaned closer to her, snagging the Gatorade and taking a sip before handing it back to her. "I know you so well that I had your getaway time pegged to within five fucking minutes - I'm that good. And I've just been waiting back here for the opportune time to make my presence known."

Elena stared at him in disbelief, she had not even the slightest idea of what to say. "You've been in the car this whole time," she said in a flat voice, anger starting to creep its way through her body. She embraced the anger - that was an emotion she could deal with right now.

"Yep," he replied with his trademark smirk. "Since I saw you getting all weepy over the pictures on your mirror. PS - how is it you don't have one of me?"

"The whole _fucking_ time?" she asked, anger now lacing her voice. He really sat back there, hidden from her, in silence, for 6 fucking hours?

"Yep," he replied again, leaning forward so his face was just a few inches from hers, "I heard every cry, every tear, every heart-wrenching sigh, and every muffled sob, sweetheart."

She stared at him, mouth set in a tight grimace, anger and indignation firing through her veins. "Get out, Damon."

"Not can do, princess," he said, climbing out of the backseat and into the front seat. "You can't just go gallivanting into the world with no protection, Klaus could get to you in an instant, and then Stefan would be heartbroken and waste away into a dessicated corpse, and Ric would fall into an alcohol induced coma, and Jeremy would go on a self sacrificial rampage, and I ... well and dot dot dot…"

"And what do you care, Damon?" she replied, her voice clearly displaying her unhappiness with the current situation. "You don't care about me anymore, remember? You moved on – with Rebekah? Now that she knows that she's not dying tonight, shouldn't the two of you be celebrating?" She felt the jealousy coursing through, and heard her voice getting louder even at the thought of Rebekah.

"Don't be so goddamn dramatic, Elena, although it's kind of a turn on - jealous rage doesn't suit you," he drawled, reaching into her bag of snack food and grabbing a candy bar to munch on. "So back to the original question. Where are we going? You want me to drive for a while? You must be exhausted."

Elena gaped at him open mouthed, still shocked at how far out of control her plan had gotten, and it didn't escape her notice that he had completely evaded her question of why he cared so much. All she knew was that now Damon was here, her little plan of freedom was shot to hell.

* * *

Elena had no idea where they were. She would say Georgia though, if she had to guess. After silently allowing Damon to take the wheel and crawling over to the passenger seat, she had drifted off into an exhausted sleep that lasted for the next couple of hours. When she had awoken, Damon was at the passenger door, opening it up to help her out into the mid morning sun. She shot him an angry glare, still furious with him for showing up.

"Hungry?" Damon asked, laughing at her anger, and helping her stay up steady as her legs wobbled underneath her. She started to shake her head to say no, but then her stomach made one of the loudest whines that she had ever heard. She realized that she had eaten a proper meal since the morning before, and suddenly she was ravenous.

Damon chuckled, and closed the car door, locking it behind her with the remote. "Fight me all you want, you know I'm right. As usual." He started walking towards the restaurant and realized she wasn't moving. He turned and looked at her, amused smirk on his face. "Well, come on then."

She followed mutely behind him, still slightly disoriented from waking up from her sleep so suddenly, and followed him into the small diner that he had found. The place was deserted, and the attractive young woman leaning against the counter looked startled to see them as the door closed behind them with a jingle of the bells hanging on them. The waitress looked like she had just had all her prayers answered with Damon's arrival into her little dump of diner. Elena rolled her eyes in disgust at the familiar reaction.

"Hi darlings, table for two?" the waitress, whose name tag read Lola, asked in a deep southern drawl. She flashed them a wide smile as she reached to grab two menus for them.

"Actually, just one," Damon replied, to Elena's surprise and Lola's disappointment. Elena watched as he flashed the waitress a charming smile, and she made a small noise of protest as he pushed her towards Lola. "I'm not hungry, and I've got a few things to take care of. Don't worry, I'll be back soon, princess." He leaned over to press a kiss on her cheek, sending tingles shooting through her body, and smiled at her in what probably looked like a loving manner – although she could see the devilish smirk he shot at her. She watched in disbelief as he strode out of the diner and out of sight, but not before flashing another smile and a wink at Lola.

Elena felt pangs of jealousy shoot through her, and glanced over to see the young woman next to her looking at the door Damon had left through as if she was in a trance.

"I'm pregnant with the jackass's baby, Lola, so back off," Elena snapped in irritation, the lie to upset the waitress flowing easily from her mouth, and the Lola snapped out of her Damon induced haze and took Elena to a table by a window, mumbling apologies under her breath for. Why she was so upset with the attention Damon received, she didn't even want to contemplate thinking about, but knowing that Lola though he was off limits just made her feel better. Elena sighed in disgust with herself, and settled in to look at the menu.

* * *

Half an hour later Damon strode back in to the diner, and Elena looked up at him from where she was just finishing up a mountainous pile of pancakes finished off with bacon, sausage, and Diet Coke. She watched as he slid into the other side of the booth, throwing a $20 bill down on the table to more than cover her feast of a breakfast.

She slid her plate towards him, asking him quietly, "Uh, do you want anything? You must be pretty hungry…"

"Nope," he replied, a satisfied and knowing smirk spreading across his face, "I had some breakfast already." Her eyes widened at his insinuation, but all he did in response was get back up, chuckling, and he held his hand out to her. "Ready to go? We've got a completely aimless and idiotic road trip to get back to."

She slid out of the booth, brushing past him, purposely not taking his hand, and making her way out to the car, calling 'thank you' to the timid Lola on the way out. Damon followed behind her pushing her away from the driver's door where she had firmly planted herself.

"Damon…" she growled softly, hand out for the keys.

"Nice try," he responded, pushing her out of the way with absolutely no effort at all on his part. He laughed at the fire he saw sparking in her eyes. "Give it up, Elena, get in the other side. you know I always win the fights I want to win."

She stood glaring at him for a minute, hands balled into fists at her side, eyes locked with Damon's, and finally with a huff, she strode around the other side and got into the passenger seat, slamming the door behind her. Damon laughed at her, making her irritation flare up even more, and he slid into the driver's seat. "So, where to, m'lady?"

"Just drive, Damon, I don't really give a shit where."

* * *

"So, merely out of curiosity, did you actually think this little plan through, Elena?" Damon asked, glancing at her from where he lay on the second double bed in the motel room they had paid for about half an hour previously. The room was small and sparse, but it was clean, warm, and most importantly, it had two beds. She had to admit, it had been a relief to finally stop driving after another 7 1/2 hours in Birmingham, Alabama and find an affordable but decent place to spend the night.

Elena pulled her eyes away from the rain drops pitter pattering lightly on the window pane, and looked at Damon silently, pondering his question, but not answering it. Had she thought this through? Did she really have a plan? Had she really though of anything besides 'get the fuck out of Mystic Falls'?

Damon scooted over to the edge of his bed, and laid on his side, head resting on his arm, eyes focused on her. "I mean, don't get me wrong, the idea of getting away for awhile is something that I can totally get behind, but do you know where it is that you want to go? How long you want to be gone for? Do you have money to make this last? Do you really think that Klaus won't be able to find you just because you're not in Mystic Falls? You don't think he's going to threaten every member of our little gang to see if they know where you are?"

Elena looked away from him and back to the window, trying to focus on the soothing sound of the rain pounding against the glass, and not the frantic beating of her heart. She had no answers for him. She had no answers for herself. Only the desperate need to get as far away from Mystic Falls as she could. To not be Elena Gilbert - girl caught in the middle of a supernatural pissing contest - anymore.

"Elena?" she heard him ask, the expectation of answers still hanging in his voice. When she still didn't respond, she felt a movement on her bed, and felt his arm on hers, pulling her around to look at him, forcing her eyes to meet his. "Did you think about any of those things? At all?"

"No!" she responded, harshly, a few tears spilling from her eyes. She couldn't believe she was letting herself cry in front of him, couldn't believe that she him have the power to get her so worked up. She rubbed the tears away furiously with the back of her hand, and looked up into his surprised face. "Is that the answer you want from me, Damon? I don't have any answers!"

"I don't want you to tell me something that you think that I want to hear, Elena," he responded, eyes flashing, "I just want the truth! I want to know what we're doing here, and why the hell we're on this little getaway mission, and what I need to worry about! I want to know what the hell is going on!"

"_We're_ not doing anything, Damon," she responded vehemently, waving her hands between the two of them, and jumping off the bed to put some distance in between them. "_I _left! _Me_, not you! I do not need you here, I do not _want_ you here, and I most certainly do not owe you anything, so why don't you just get the hell out of my face, out of my motel room, and out of my god-forsaken life!"

He looked at her with raised eyebrows, his mouth slightly open in shock, but he said nothing in response to her bitter outburst. He got off of her bed, and moved back over to his, grabbing the remote as he did so. Elena watched in sheer and utter disbelief as he settled back into the same comfortable pose he had been in earlier and flipped the tv on. She stood completely still for almost a minute as she watched him watch the tv, and when in it finally sunk in that he was not leaving like she so desperately wanted him to, she stomped back to her bed and laid down, her back to him, head cradled on her arms, eyes on the window, the tears leaking from her eyes until she finally drifted off into a fitful sleep.

* * *

**Day 3**

Elena hummed softly, maybe even happily, as she slid behind the driver's seat of her SUV and put the keys in the ignition. When she had awoken ½ an hour earlier, the room was empty of any sign of Damon. It was like he had never even been there. After a small moment of feeling completely abandoned and totally pissed off at him for leaving her, she realized that he had done _exactly_ what she had asked of him and left her the hell alone. He was gone. It was just her again, and the plan was back on. She told herself that it was better for him to not be here, and that she needed to take advantage of his absence to move on. She jumped in the shower and gathered up her things quickly, wanting to get out as fast as possible now that she had decided that asking him to leave had been the right thing to do. She wanted to leave before she risked the chance that he would come back. Having Damon along with her was an unnecessary distraction, and she didn't want any reminders of Mystic Falls or the Salvatore brothers slowing her down.

Elena turned on the ignition and put the car in reverse, glancing up at the rearview mirror to make sure that the coast was clear for her to back out. Her heart jumped to her throat as she saw Damon's image reflected there – standing about five feet behind the car, dressed in his sinful and familiar black from head to toe, arms crossed, his customary smirk gone, and a positively murderous look adorning his gorgeous face. In the blink of an eye he blurred to the passenger side and was sitting in the seat beside her, studying her intently with furious eyes. She swallowed uncomfortably, completely unable to look over to his side of the car, and shakily put her foot to the gas.

Elena said nothing as she slowly backed out of the parking space and got onto the highway – and neither did he.

* * *

Four hours. Four fucking hours. Elena had been driving along for four hours with not a sound from the silent vampire in her passenger seat – and she was going to go batshit crazy. She didn't think he'd even moved once since jumping into the seat after she had tried to drive away without him, except for the one time he had reached out to stop her from turning on the music - and she couldn't take it anymore! She figured that he was angry with her for trying to pull her little getaway stunt, but how was she supposed to have known that he was outside? His stuff was gone, so of course she had assumed he was too! She had done nothing wrong! Nothing! he was acting like a petulant child! Elena rationalized that she could understand him being slightly perturbed at what had happened, but to not say anything to her at all after having to endure the 'non' scenery of Alabama and Mississippi, which they had passed in to about 2 hours before, was just cruel plain and simple. She realized that if she decided that she wanted to be back in his good graces – which she was not sure she wanted, she told herself - she had a lot of making up to do.

Elena sighed in frustration as the trip odometer said that she had just driven her 999th mile. Her stomach growled painfully, reminding her that she hadn't eaten since her diner breakfast with Lola the day before and she realized that she also needed to heed the call of nature. When she saw signs for a suburb on the outside of Jackson, she pulled off of the highway and into the first gas station that she could find. Still, Damon said and did nothing. Not even a fucking blink. She hesitated with the keys in her hand, unsure of whether to leave them in the car, or take them with her. Damon seemed to show no signs of going in to the store with her, so she gently put them in one of the cup holders in the console between them. She quickly grabbed her purse out of the back seat and went into the store.

When she emerged a few minutes later with a lighter bladder and 2 Subway turkey subs that she had bought from the little restaurant inside, she was surprised to see that Damon had pulled the SUV up to a gas pump and was leaning up against the side of her car, waiting for the pump to stop. The sight of him leaning so casually against her car made her heart constrict a little, and she unconsciously decided to take a moment to observe him, unobserved. He was beautiful. Seriously, heartbreakingly, earth-shatteringly, breath-takingly, undeniably beautiful. She knew it, he knew it, the lady pumping gas next to him knew it, hell - the gas pump probably knew it – and it was an inanimate object. Her eyes traveled from the smooth angle of his jaw down to his tightly muscled arms crossed against that perfectly sculpted chest. She had only seen it a few times, but just one moment had been enough to sear the sight onto her brain forever. As a stranger brushed against her arm on his way into the store, she broke out of her reverie, and shook her head with a feeling of embarrassment. What the hell was she doing? What the hell was she thinking? But despite feeling silly, she felt a little bit of hope start to spring to life within her that the silent hours of the morning's drive were gone. As soon as she really realized what she was thinking, she shook her head in disgust at herself, and immediately quashed her thoughts. What did she care if he was talking to her or not – she didn't want him here anyways, right? Distraction. With a capital D.

Elena walked around the front of the car to climb into the front seat, but Damon's hand shot out to hold the driver's door closed. "It's my turn to drive, sporty spice." Hearing words come out of his mouth made her grin just a little bit, and she walked around to the passenger side of the car without a fight, slipping into the seat as he returned the pump and slid into the driver's seat.

"I, uh," Elena started, unsure of what to say, despite that fact that what she wanted to say was so simple. He looked over to her and she cleared her throat and started again, "I bought you a sandwich… thought you might be hungry?"

She held it out to him, and he took it from her, giving the wrapped torpedo a sniff, "Turkey?"

"Uh, yeah," Elena replied sheepishly, "I realized I have no idea what kind of sandwich you like, 'cause they don't have blood sandwiches, and I was getting turkey, so…"

"Anything to drink?" Damon asked after he quietly examined the sub for moment. She reached down to the bag between her legs and pulled out a soda for him. He nodded, taking the soda from her and cracking it open as he put the car in drive.

Twenty minutes later they had both finished off their subs and sodas and Elena was relaxing against the seat, her stomach full and content. She glanced at Damon out of the corner of her eye, and saw a small smile on his face that warmed her heart.

* * *

The light rain started to fall not long after, and the soothing sounds of it tapping on the metal of the car lulled Elena into a sleep that she didn't wake up from until Damon shook her shoulder gently. Elena sleepily opened her eyes and glanced at the clock in the car. 7:03. She had been out for longer that she had thought.

"Where are we?" Elena asked Damon, covering a yawn with the back of her hand as she stretched out her cramped muscles. She pretended not to see his eyes raking over her body as she arched her back gracefully.

"A motel. Just outside New Orleans," Damon replied, blurring out of his side of the car and round to hers, opening the door for her before making his way to the trunk to grab their stuff. "Since there's no actual game plan, I thought we could explore a little tomorrow."

Five minutes later Elena found herself sitting on another motel bed, waiting patiently for Damon to finish in the shower of the small bathroom. He had dropped their stuff on his bed and gone straight to the shower as soon as they had entered the room. As soon as she had sat down on the (rather uncomfortable feeling) bed she realized that despite the fact that she had been sleeping in the car most of the afternoon, she was still exhausted. As soon as she realized that she was still exhausted, she realized that she wasn't just exhausted now – she had been exhausted for months. And months. And fucking months. Physically exhausted, emotionally exhausted. Whatever kind of exhausted you could be, she was. She felt completely drained and 100% empty, as if her batteries were completely wiped out, and no matter how much she had been trying to recharge them, they never quite took a charge. Making the decision to skip a shower tonight, she shrugged out of her sweater, leaving her in a cami and leggings, kicked her shoes off quickly and crawled underneath the scratchy covers.

When Damon came out of the bathroom a minute later, she was almost asleep, and she could sense him looking at her in surprise. He crawled into his bed and flipped on the tv, keeping the volume down low so as not to disturb her. She flipped over so that she was lying facing him, and gathered up her courage to say what she knew she needed to say.

"I'm sorry about this morning, Damon," she said in a near whisper. She watched him intently for any signs of recognition. She saw his jaw clench for a few seconds, then slowly relax, and he moved over to the side of the bed so that he could reach out and squeeze her hand gently, giving her a genuine smile.

"I know," he replied, moving back to his spot on the bed. "You're tired. We'll talk tomorrow." Elena breathed out a small sigh of relief at knowing he had accepted her apology. She closed her eyes and listened to the gentle pitter-patter of the rain outside, letting it lull her into a relaxed state.

"And Elena – roast beef and swiss on wheat with mustard. That's my favorite sandwich."

As she drifted off to sleep, it occurred to Elena that she had never been so happy to learn what someone's favorite sandwich was in her whole life.

* * *

**So... there is the end of Days 1-3. Thoughts? Hope you enjoyed it! Please Review :) And stay tuned for more days of their little roadtrip!**


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